On goes the stream of German watches that adorn these pages. I simply cannot cease mentioning the bounty of impressive watches coming out of German. Nomos is one of Germany’s more established and recognizable watches. They are built in the Glashutte (Glashuette) region of Germany, but should not be confused with other watches which display the “Glashutte” name, which is merely a region. Thus, Glashutte Original, and Muhle Glashutte are different watches.

Each Nomos watch has a similar look, and most each model is a hand-wound manually operated mechanical movement. Wonderfully enough, Nomos produces it’s own movements which is places in most watches. This is incredible given the average price of Nomos watches are between $1,500 and $2,500. To some, the fact that some Nomos Watches are hand-wound is a detriment. Yes, you do have to spend the time winding the watches each day, but the watches are very thin. Further, you get a sapphire case back window in which you can view the movement on many of the watches. So while hand-wound manual Nomos watches are perhaps not perfect for everyday wear, it is certainly appropriate on many occasions and for the watch enthusiast. Then again, if you don’t have a manual watch, you aren’t aware of the simple, yet very real pleasure there is in winding a watch. A reminder that you are wearing a working machine that you must attend to. There exists some basic pleasure in winding a watch to keep it running. Nomos does however produce automatic movements in some, but not all of it’s watches. Look for automatic movements in some of it’s Tangomat, Tangente, as well as other models.

From a design standpoint, the Nomos watches are pure functional minimalism with Bauhaus inspiration. Pictures above is the new Nomos Tangente watches which are manual watches with an in house movement. The color combinations and symmetry are next to perfect. Other models are similar and Nomos also makes in-house automatic movements as mentioned above. Nomos watches can be appreciated for their simple Bauhaus designs, but the real appreciation comes in knowing Nomos watches contain house-made movements are are in the inexpensive $2000 range. Worlds apart form other in-house movement watch makers. nomos-glashutte.com

See Nomos watches available on eBay here.